The State Bank of India’s fifth attempt to auction Vijay Mallya’s 17,000 square feet Kingfisher House in Mumbai, which served as the corporate office of the now defunct Kingfisher Airlines, proved to be a damp squib on Wednesday as no bidders came forward, reported PTI.
In the previous auction held in March, the reserve price of the property had been lowered by 10% – from Rs 103.50 crore to Rs 93.50 – by a lender consortium led by SBI. The reserve price was set at Rs 115 crore during the auction last December.
Those participating in the auction had to submit an Earnest Money Deposit of Rs 9.35 crore. SBI officials said not a single bidder showed any interest in the auction.
“There were lot of enquiries for the property from buyers but none of them deposited the bids in today’s auction,” a banker was quoted as saying by PTI.
The very first auction had taken place in March 2016, when the reserve price was Rs 150 crore. Despite a 38% reduction in the reserve price, the attempt to sell the property, located in Ville Parle in Mumbai, has failed multiple times.
SBI had taken custody of the Kingfisher House in February 2015 following the non-payment of loans worth Rs 6,963 crore. Mallya owes over Rs 9,000 crore to more than 17 banks in India.
Mallya’s Kingfisher Villa, at Condolim in north Goa, was sold to Viking Media and Entertainment’s Sachin Joshi for a whopping Rs 73.01 crore in April.
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